Founder of TBC Bank, Mamuka Khazaradze made an announcement today that he has decided to step down from TBC Bank Board. The full statement issued by Khazaradze reads as follows:
“Dear friends and supporters of TBC Bank, First of all, I would like to thank you for your friendship and support throughout 27 years. There comes a time in your life when you have to make important decisions and I’ve often been in such situations, in fact I am being in one right now. I won’t repeat myself about the fact that our team and our bank are being attacked. As a result of this, international investors have lost over 200 million US dollars in past month, which subsequently was a serious damage for our country as well. Without any investigation or court decision they have damaged our reputation by connecting us to so-called money laundering cases, which has been proven to be false on international level.
Unfortunately, none of the government representatives, including PM and Ministers, have expressed the willingness to meet us and ask us about the case of this significance not just for our team, but for an entire country. Even though I’ve contacted a few of them on my own and even sent some documents , I haven’t gotten response from any of them.
I’ve understood that the aim was to discredit me and that they are fighting against the success. Another thing that I’ve understood is that was that the development of a company should have certain limits in Georgia. Such attack on me is directly influencing the reputation of the bank. The bank cannot be involved in a court dispute with its regulator for a long period of time, especially when the NBG is not free in its decision-making, even when the law sets a high standard for its independency.
Today, supervisory board in London has made the decision to stop legal dispute with National Bank of Georgia and this decision was based on the interests of our bank, our stockers and depositors. Thus, I’ve made the decision to leave the bank, where I’ve spent 27 years and which I’ve turned into largest players of the region just from 500 dollars.
I hope that this decision will positively affect the stable and peaceful development of the bank. As far as it goes for me, I will dedicate my whole energy to a very important matter for our country – development of Anaklia project. I hope that I will be able to finish what I’ve started.
In order to present all the details of the case in a peaceful and environment, I will be at the committee hearing at the Parliament on Tuesday, as I’ve made the promise to the society and parliament. At the same time, I will continue defending my rights in court as a private entity in Georgia and outside of Georgia.
Mamuka Khazaradze”
The official announcement of TBC Bank which was published by London Stock Exchange as well reads that the bank will have a restructuring of its supervisory board.
“since TBC Bank takes into account the possible damage to the country's investment image and respects the role of the National Bank, as a qualified regulator, and despite the fact that the decisions of the National Bank was appealed in the court, JSC TBC Bank would like to announce that it will implement a restructuring of its Supervisory Board whereby the founding shareholders will not be represented at the supervisory Board of JSC TBC Bank.”, reads the announcement.
It was also mentioned in the announcement that TBC Bank will withdraw all court cases against NBG and will pay around 1 million Georgian Lari to NBG.
National Bank of Georgia has already commented on this decision and stated that this will positively affect the transparency of the bank:
“NBG welcomes this decision. This will have a positive effect on the transparency of the Bank and will increase investor confidence, which will ultimately have a positive effect on the development of the Bank and the country's financial sector.”, reads the announcement of NBG.
